interesting article on falwell from slate

Post Reply New Topic

It's denying me my rights because it's sexist. I cannot marry a woman simply because I am not male. Two adults (one male, one female) would never be prevented from marrying each other, as long as they were not already married. Therefore why can't I marry the person I want to be with? I want the same protection for my relationship that a heterosexual couple can have.
Why should I not be allowed that? How is my relationship in any way inferior to their's?

What does physical difference have to do with anything? Stopping me marrying a woman because of my sex is no different than stopping me marry a black person because of the colour of my skin.

Again, where did the right come from? What is it's intellectual origin?

What about the United States Constitution? Why can't this right be attained through the legislature like Woman's Suffrage?



Yes. That is true. However, that has been the case for all of history. This "right" is a fundamentally new and worthy of debate and it's consequences. Men really aren't even designed for a single partner really. There aren't monogamous. It was religion that instituted the practice. However that doesn't mean that because it might be unfair to the "male ideal" that the laws should be changed. There are many factors involved.



Your relationship very well may be a close personal loving relationship as close as any bond that any close couple feels.

I shouldn't have asked this. I didn't ask this in a effort to make this um...testy or difficult, but it was an unwise question I think in retrospect. I was curious, and was not offended by your response, but I didn't consider the possibility that you might have been angered. Even if you were not I think I didn't take enough time to think through the question.

I apologize.

Yeah, and I'll bet those who opposed the emancipation and manumission of the slave population worried about the effect on society that freeing the slaves would bring. That doesn't make slavery any less wrong.

Meanwhile, up here in Canada where same-sex marriage was given legal sanction two years ago, things are pretty much the same as they were before.

actually black on white crime has gone up A TON since we made slavery illegal. we were better off keeping them as slaves.


.....at least by jimservo's logic.

I don't dispute that at all. But, again, I think the comparison of the end of slavery, and the civil rights movement to the desire for same-sex marriage, or equality in adoptions for same-sex couples is utterly ridiculous.



We clearly have a different interpretations of events. In re: to effects. The laws have changed, definitive effects will take more time. This isn't like a tax cut where quickly sails in. Social dynamics are more subtle and often develop beneath the surface over time (especially when we are talking about children growing up).

Explain. Both involve the removal of a denial of what some would deem to be basic human rights.

Or if you reject my attempt at "reductio ad absurdum", what about the repeal of laws that forbade whites from marrying non-whites? Again, I am sure your argument about how it will affect society would be equally valid there. Please explain why it applies to same-sex marriage but not black-and-white marriage.




We clearly have a different interpretations of events. In re: to effects. The laws have changed, definitive effects will take more time. This isn't like a tax cut where quickly sails in. Social dynamics are more subtle and often develop beneath the surface over time (especially when we are talking about children growing up).[/quote]

Children have been raised by gay parents for a long time. Now, the gay parents can get legally married. This would increase the chances of a stable home environment for the child. Seems to me this would be a *good* thing, no?

Last edited by Xenon on 19 May 2007, 11:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.

That's a neat trick. Xenon used an analogy noting that I worried about long term effects, and he pointed out (correctly) that those who supported slavery also worried about long term effects (although they made absurd claims about things like race wars, mostly).

skafather84 jumps up and says "black on white crime has gone up A TON since we [by which the Union army] made slavery illegal." Of, well, that's pretty obvious isn't it. They weren't slaves anymore. Under the system of slavery murder of a white was punished by the execution of all as a way to prevent revolts. It was a horribly unethical system. He adds sarcastically "we were better off keeping them as slaves."

Oh, skafather84, but I never said that. In fact, I never even made the analogy in the first place! I consider slavery to be a far more brutal and despicable crime then not allowing same-sex marriage (which I don't consider to be a "crime" at all). But you know what I do consider to be a serious crime? Hanging homosexuals, and stoning them to death. You can see that in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and elsewhere in the Arab world.

You want truly reactionary fundamentalist dogma, believe me, largely it ain't here.

that's nice..iran sucks. i know this already. i wouldn't use iran as a basis for where we are or where we should be going.


i don't go "well i haven't killed many people like john wayne gacy did so i'm a good person." and that's essentially what you do there by drawing a conclusion with iran.

You cannot base policy based merely on what some want because such policies inherently combat with each other. I see no constitutional basis for mandated state recognition of same-sex marriage, so I do not see how I violate the rights of the people to decide through their elected representatives or ballot initiatives to decide policy on the subject. If a state wants to vote (as Vermont did with civil unions) to decide to not have my preferred policy that certainly is there right. I am not even sure about the Constitution Amendment that bans same-sex marriage because I think a better amendment may be possible that simply preserves the right for each state, without court interference, to decide the issue.



I think such laws are unethical. While I am not a legal expert, I do have a general philosophy, which I have expressed. In the process of thinking about this (which I honestly had to think about a bit), and did a little searching and came up with something which contradicts something I posted before, namely that no Supreme Court Justice has used the Declaration of Independence as a legal document (although when I said as in the same way as the Constitution I probably was correct):



I would add this would be consistent with Justice John Marshall Harlan, the lone dissenter in Plessy v. Ferguson.



Thus I would say that is very well may be a reasonable argument that the courts could have overturned (perhaps on better grounds) the bans on interracial marriage.



We differ on how drastic the difference is.



The entire concept of what a marriage was for all of human history was male-female. There was indeed more open homosexual behavior that was celebrated at one point, but not same-sex marriage. The modern monogamous marriage, which in the West has been spread through Judeo-Christianity, is centered around the family, or it at least traditionally has been. We are now debating something that is going to have effects for the future of our cultures of the West.

The ban on black-white marriage has a different history. It was a product of the post-slavery segregationist age. Ironically, segregation was first put in place to protect Blacks from racist Whites, but that is a long part of a complex story.

Historically, marriage has been about passing on posession of a woman and everything she owns, from her father to her husband. It is traditionally sexist. The definition of marriage has changed plenty of times, as society's attitudes to X, Y and Z change. Society is now more accepting of gay people. Therefore why can't the definition of marriage now reflect this?
Family has nothing to do with it. Do you think only heterosexual couples have families?
Do you seriously think that allowing a man to marry a man, or a woman to marry a woman, is going to completely mess up society?

I don't see how that will change just by allowing same-sex marriage. A gay couple, with or without children, is just as much a family as a straight couple, with or without children.